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A car load of of went to a friends farm to pick apples. The apple orchard we descended upon was semi-wild and not sprayed for pests and things. Organic!

When using organic(!) apples you should know several things. The bugs you might find are technically edible. I set the worms and apples free when I found wiggly things. I did cook the apples with bruising from the worms. Any spots and rust on the on the outside can be cut or peeled away. Its also technically edible.

Not worm!

worm!

If you pick up apples off the ground they can be contaminated with ecoli. Cooking apples, or pasteurizing drinks made with apples will kill this and other bacteria.

How to pickle beetrots. First take a distilling pan an place two bricks in. Then arrange some wooden sticks on top of them and add water to the pan, but not so much that it reaches the sticks. Arrange the beetroots on top of the sticks and place the lid on top of the pan. Put on a good fire so the beetroots will be cooked in the steam, but without bleeding. When they are cooked, cleaned and cold, they should be cut into thin slices, and some horseradish should be cut into small pieces (as when lardons are chopped up). Take an new glazed jar and first place a layer of the aforementioned sliced beetroots in it; then sprinkle some horseradish, caraway, finely crushed pepper and a small amount of salt over this. Add more layers of beetroots and the aforementioned spices. Then good ale vinegar is poured over, or half ale vinegar, half wine vinegar, as much as needed to cover the beetroots. Then place a lid with a clean weight on top on the jar, tie a clean cloth over it and store in a convenient place. The beetroots can be used in a few days; but do not stir them with bare fingers.

Ingredients (test run size)

3 medium or 6 small beets, steamed, quartered

1 tbsp horseradish, shredded

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper, ground

1/2 tsp caraway

1/4 cup white wine

1/4 cup white wine vinegar

Directions

Put a small layer of beets in glass jar. Sprinkle some horseradish and spices on top. Repeat until jar is full.

I’ve talked before about cooking dishes for “in lent” and alternative thickeners but I thought this pie, “A Frydayes Pye” was interesting because it deviates in instruction from what I expect from a herb and apple pie.

I have the recipe for “Tarts of Borrage” on page 229 of my Big Buttes Book, and its different from the recipe below because it wilts, or blanches the herbs, and softens the fruit before they are baked. They are also baked along with egg yolks, which this recipe also doesn’t have.

I’ve combined the ingredients, and I started making this using a closed pie instead of an open tart so the greens wouldn’t dry out, and I felt it was more “coffin” as described in the original.

Well after 45 minutes it was a soggy wet mess. I opened the lids and cooked them uncovered for another 30 minutes to try to salvage them.

The greens did dry out with the open lid but it wasn’t unpleasant. My husband had thirds, so not a complete disaster.

My dog keeps trying to steal it, which is weird. He isn’t a table surfer, but he seems strangely motivated.

I consider the pie a failure, but luckily I have a husband (or a dog) who will hide the evidence. When reading through historic recipes, we don’t have the author’s notes or reasoning behind their decisions. We just have to try it as written and see what happens.

I also think that if I’d cooked them as smaller hand pies and on a higher heat it might not be as soggy. Also blanching the veggies and squeezing out the liquid would go a long way.

A Fridayes Pye, without eyther Flesh or Fish. Wash greene Beetes cleane, picke out the middle string, and chop them small with two or three well relisht ripe Apples. Season it with Pepper, Salt, and Ginger: then take a good handfull of Razins of the Sunne, and put all in a Coffin of fine Paste, with a piece of sweet Butter, and so bake it: but before you serue it in, cut it vp, and wring in the iuyce of an Orenge, and Sugar. John Murrell A NEVV BOOKE of Cookerie (England, 1615)

Sometimes you find two recipes that are fairly similar but with small differences. Like the two recipes that are back to back in A BOOK OF COOKRYE :

To bake small meats.Take Egges and seethe them hard, then take the yolkes out of them and braye them in the morter, and temper them with Creme, and then straine them, and put to them Pepper, Saffron, Cloves, Maced, small raisins, Almonds blanched and small shred and grated bread.
Take Peares also sodden in Ale, and bray and straine them with the same Licour, and put therto Bastard and Honny, and put it into a pan and stir it on the fire til it be wel sodden, then make little coffins and set them in the Oven til they be hard, and then take them out againe, and put the foresaid licour into them and so serve them forth.

To make small bake meats of Sirup and Peares.
Take Peares and seethe them in Ale, then bray them and straine them and put Sanders to them and Ale, with the spices aforesaide, and the Coffins in likewise ordered, and so put in the sirup. A.W. A BOOK OF COOKRYE (1591)

The first “to bake small meats” recipe is pretty straight forward, a honey sweetened pear puree tart with a thick cream sauce that uses all the things to thicken the sauce. The second tart is less clear. Instead of simmering the pear mixture its baked, with a ‘sirup’. Its not clear what the ‘sirup’ A.W. is talking about here.

“…and make your sirrop half with rosewater and half with that liquor & put double sugar to your Orenges, and when your sirup is halfe sodden…”

“To make sirup of Violets. … and put to them so much rosewater as you think good then let them boyle altogither untill the colour be forth of them, then take them of the fire and straine them through a fine cloth, then put so much Sugar to them as you thing good…”

So the ‘sirup’ in the second recipe can be three things:

the cream sauce from the first recipe.

sugar + the cooking liquid

sugar + rosewater and cooking liquid

It cannot be verjuice + sugar because I said so.

So a mad scientist er a medieval recipe enthusiast googles the recipes to see what other people have done, and as of today I found nothing for either recipe. The other option open to the cook is to try the variations and see which tastes better.

Make cream sauce: Take 2 egg yolks and mast in mortar and pestle, adding cream slowly. Stir the liquid in the mortar, and slowly pour through a colander into another bowl. Add spices, raisins, almond meal and bread crumbs into cream mixture. Stir well and set aside.

Pre-heat oven to 350.

Place pear puree, wine and honey into sauce pan and brig to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

Place 1 tbsp of pear mixture into each tart shell.

Bake for 35 minutes, until tarts are brown.

Place 1/2 tbsp of the cream mixture on each hot tart, spreading it out with a knife or spoon. Make sure there is at least 1 raisin on each tart.

I am deviating from English cooking for the following 16th Century, German recipe:

To make an apple tart. Take apples, peel them and grate them with a grater, afterwards fry them in fat. Then put in it as much grated cheese as apples, some ground cloves, a little ginger and cinnamon, two eggs. Stir it together well. Then prepare the dough as for a flat cake, put a small piece of fat into it so that it does not rise, and from above and below, weak heat. Let it bake slowly.Das Kuchbuch der Sabina Welserin

I found the recipe by throwing “apple” and “cheese” into the Medieval Cookery search engine because I had too many cooking apples and cheese wass on sale. Sometimes that’s just all the inspiration you need.

I confess, I hand grated the quartered apple slices and the peels came right off, I didn’t need to peel them. It’s very similar to how straining poached fruit through a colander also removes skins. I discovered it because I was rushing and didn’t pay attention. How will I ever learn if I get results like this?

My house smells like Christmas.

If I was taking my time with this I would look up recipes for ‘flat cake’ and do the crust properly.

Ingredients:

4-5 apples, peeled and grated

1 large tablespoon butter

1/4 tsp cloves, ground

1 tsp cinnamon, ground

1 tsp ginger, ground

7 oz cheese, grated

2 eggs, lighting beaten with a fork

a pie shell

Directions

Heat skillet on medium-high and melt butter. Add grated apple and saute until most of the moisture is absorbed.

Preheat oven to 350F.

Weight cooked apples and measure out an equal amount of cheese, or just add all the cheese and combine.

Add spices and egg to apple mixture and mix well.

Pour apple mixture into pie shell and bake for 50 minutes, until crust and top of pie have browned.